It took a geologist's age to do it, but Chris Mullin finally found a talented player on a team so bad that going to the Warriors would seem like a fabulous career move.

At least that's the upside to getting Baron Davis from the New Orleans Hornets, the only team in the Western Conference that envies the Warriors. The cost was reasonable (although Dale Davis and Speedy Claxton might have different thoughts), and it creates some desperately needed buzz for a team that has yet again played tease-and-freeze with the fan base.

Of course, this being the Warriors, there is a downside as well. They have picked up the one thing they actually don't need -- a go-to guy -- and they haven't improved themselves in the areas in which they need help most desperately.

But let's keep the mood lively, shall we? Mullin is happy, Mike Montgomery is as happy as he intends to let on, Jason Richardson is happy, and the people who watch this team every day (to their usual regret) have something new to watch in the final 28 games. In a lost year, the final third offers at least possibilities of something other than the usual thing, and we all know how well the usual thing has worked.

Davis leaves the hideous Hornets and the dark moods he had while playing there. He was injured and dissatisfied, desperate to leave a dead-end team, and willing to make a stand somewhere else, even in Oakland. He is a West Coast guy, and the bayou's charms (humidity, gambling, great food and Byron Scott) just weren't working for him.

And the Warriors -- well, what do they have to lose? Dale Davis was a temp worker here anyway, and Claxton is an earnest but limited point guard. Under normal circumstances, the price was downright cheap.

That is, if Baron Davis gets healthy. His back, knees and heel are real barkers, and his contract is uninsured, so if he can't get physically right, the Warriors are even more doomed than they already are.

But Mullin's Plan A wasn't working, the team had taken a dramatic turn to the rear from last year, when the players hated their coach, and all the optimism from last offseason had eroded into same-old, same-old mode.

Mullin had to do something, and since Richardson, Troy Murphy, Mike Dunleavy and Derek Fisher's contracts have been deemed untouchable, the Davis deal dropped from the sky, a seeming gift from a normally vengeful basketball god.

A healthy Baron Davis gives the Warriors a settled backcourt (although one suspects he and Richardson will have some in-house squabbles over touches now and then), and while they are still not a good defensive or rebounding team, they would be more capable of doing what they do well, which is go up and down the floor. The Warriors aren't a fundamentally inspirational team, but they can throw up shots and get up and down the floor, and try to outscore teams through sheer volume -- sort of a Costco version of the Phoenix Suns.

Does this save the season? Please. Baron Davis doesn't make this team go 27-1 down the stretch. Does this energize the season? Well, not by itself. Andris Biedrins is going to have play more to show just how NBA his game is, and Nikoloz Tskitishvili and Rodney White, who came to Oakland in the undercard, might get a chance to show their wares as well.

In other words, the Warriors are now absurdly young (average age: 24 years, 9 months) which means both promising and error-prone. They are jaw- slackeningly thin (the only widebody is Adonal Foyle), and their height (five players 6-foot-10 and over, only Fisher and Davis below 6-6) isn't the kind of height that makes other teams worry. It's another new look for a team still paying for the crime of orange alternate uniforms.

But the risk of change in this case is again better than the risk of staying the same. Baron Davis gives Warriors fans something new to think about.

In this case, that a good player is in a situation so awful that the Warriors seem like an upgrade.